


Blue Moon

by syrupwit



Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, canon-typical food service workplace awfulness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-28
Updated: 2020-05-28
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:53:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24384604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syrupwit/pseuds/syrupwit
Summary: From the moment the first unreadable markings appeared on his palm, Zim had known he had to keep it a secret.
Relationships: Dib/Zim (Invader Zim)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 162
Collections: Writing Rainbow Make Up Round





	Blue Moon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Alana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alana/gifts).



> Title from the [classic song of the same name](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eMkH0s3Vpc).

From the moment the first unreadable markings appeared on his palm, Zim had known he had to keep it a secret. Certainly it was unheard of for an Irken to have a soulmate, much less an Irken Invader of his rank. He covered his hands as often as he could, shoving them in the pockets of his apron during the rare breaks Sizz-Lorr allowed and wearing longer gloves in case his sleeves gaped. Of course he couldn't hide them all the time, but his burns from the Happy Shloogorgh suit at least provided camouflage. If he were to be found out, the consequences would be far worse than a little pain.

(Across the galaxy, on a planet no one had ever heard of, a small boy discovered strange patterns marbled across his hands. They didn’t hurt him, but he felt that they hurt someone else.)

As the years leaked on from the drippy faucet of Zim’s life, the markings gained purpose and coherence. After one long shift, he collapsed in his tiny rest-cubby to discover the first message scrawled across his hand. _ARE YOU THERE?_ it said, in a writing system he understood without recognizing. Zim—exhausted, half-mad, still smarting from the punishment for a particularly negative customer service review—hesitated only briefly before writing back.

Communication was slow at first, stilted and secretive. The other person felt somewhat younger than Zim, but also seemed to be from a species that matured much faster than Irkens, judging by the rapid evolution of their messages’ complexity. This should have been humiliating, as the Empire discouraged all but the most practical of relationships with lesser beings. Trade, research, military partnerships—these were acceptable; but not personal connections, not _attachments._ A proper Invader would have never responded to his soulmate’s message in the first place. At some point Zim grew too angry and lonely to care.

It was strange how much they found to talk about. He hadn’t anticipated how pleasant it would be. The other accepted the things Zim told them without sneering at his height or position. When they asked questions, they seemed genuinely interested in his answers. Their world was far more limited than the ones Zim knew, and their understanding of science and mathematics bewilderingly primitive, but their ignorance was compensated with a penetrating intelligence. Zim began to look forward to his scattered moments alone as more than a chance to catch his breath amid the dreary clamor of Shloogorgh’s.

The correspondence continued through Zim’s escape from exile, his welcome at the Great Assigning, and his arrival on Earth. Between his penpal and his new SIR unit, Zim occupied the hours outside of skool and schemes with more broadly positive one-on-one interaction than he had ever thought to experience. It almost made up for, well, everything else. 

It took longer than he would have admitted to realize that the other’s writing system was among those used on Earth. Initially, this excited him. Then it filled him with despair. The completion of his mission, the attainment of every goal he had ever striven for, would mean losing the closest thing he had to an equal. Zim brooded for a week, resolving to sever the attachment now, but the other’s increasingly panicked messages and his own relief upon finally replying nipped that idea in the bud.

Then there was the issue of the Dib-creature. How Zim loathed him! That ratty, smelly, interfering human could never discover his secret. It made Zim queasy with fury to think of Dib interrogating his soulmate or capturing them to run tests on them. _Can he feel this?_ the Dib would probably ask, prodding his soulmate’s tender parts with his enragingly clever hands. _Does it hurt Zim when I hurt you?_ It did, metaphysically, but Zim never wanted Dib to find out.

(As it happened, Dib found out a long time before he did. It took place later than Zim alleged, and Dib had taken a while to really process it, but after one especially rancorous battle he’d looked at his hands and seen a florid, unmistakable mark where he had gashed Zim across the palm. He started wearing gloves to fight after that.)

Life progressed. Zim grew, in years if not in stature or wisdom, and the other grew as well. The Dib-human shot up like an ugly, stupid weed, maybe one of the monster ones they got on Planet Dirt every other century and needed to call in the Weedwhacking Corps to get rid of. Dib took delight in physically looking down on Zim—he had gathered some scant details of Irken social structure, which he used against Zim whenever possible—and seemed oblivious to the turmoil his transformation provoked. Irkens weren’t supposed to feel attraction any more than they were supposed to have soulmates. Once again, Zim found himself an exception.

Things came to a head three days after GIR ate Dib’s hard drives. The plan had been to access Dib’s top-secret files from the robot’s stomach, but as with most plans involving GIR, things went a little off-book. Zim snuck back to Dib’s room to search for clues on how to exorcise his minion of the dozen spelldrive spirits using him as a projector.

His mission was time-limited, as the human would be home soon. Zim rooted through dirty laundry, ransacked the closet and the cobwebbed space beneath Dib’s bed—did the beast ever clean?—and finally tore open his mattress to locate a stash of paper notebooks. 

The notebooks were old and couldn’t help with Zim’s current predicament, but they answered a question he didn’t know he had. He had never seen so much of Dib’s handwriting in one place. Dib kept most of his data electronically; he was careful to hide his notes from Zim in class. Zim had assumed it was because he plotted in them. 

The penmanship of Zim’s soulmate was neither skilled nor poor, but had certain quirks that Zim recognized almost unconsciously. He identified them in page after page of Dib’s notes, observing the tells that pointed to authentic creation, and then he shut the book. He had taken too long. Through the cracked-open window, he heard Dib arriving home. 

It made sense. The coincidences, the _feelings,_ the odd almost-yearning he sometimes felt around the human… It made sense. But he could not accept it. Zim was already good at denial, and he was about to get a lot more practice. In this moment, though, he felt an almost rapturous relief, suffusing from the tips of his wig-stifled antennae to the soles of his boot-buckled feet.


End file.
